The Dickey Dispatch – April 7th, 2025

by Senator Adrian Dickey
Happy Monday Senate District 44!

Last week was a busy one! One of the busiest tasks was reviewing the Governor’s appointments and passing them through the various committees they serve on. One of the unique aspects of serving in the Senate is that the Senate handles all of the Governor’s appointments. There are hundreds of appointments on various boards and commissions throughout the state so one can understand what a daunting task it can be running all of their confirmations in a week-long period. Between appointments that I had to run individually or through the Workforce Committee that I am the chairman of, I had an excess of 30 appointments. I’m glad those are behind us!

Wednesday was homeschool day at the Capitol. Many Iowans have chosen to homeschool their kids for a variety of reasons for the past 50 years and supporting these parents and their decision is important. Homeschoolers from Mount Pleasant made the trip and after their tour of the Capitol, I was able to visit with them and talk about what a normal day in the Senate looks like.

I also had a GREAT group of pastors from Mahaska County visit. The religious community is always so generous and gracious with their prayers and it has always amazed me how strong the religious community’s presence is in the Capitol on a daily basis. Not a day goes by where one doesn’t see a handful of religious leaders from throughout the state in our Capitol simply offering the kindness of prayer to get through a difficult day. Christianity is a huge part for many Iowans including myself and I will continue to stand up for my values and defend religious beliefs and convictions.

We passed several bills out of Workforce. One of them was the governor’s bill which required the state to provide extended maternity leave to parents that are state employees. While on the surface that sounds good, it was a bill that I was personally against because it is another fringe benefit that private sector employers have a difficulty to match. Private businesses in Iowa are the vast majority of employers, yet they struggle every day in trying to hire qualified people when they’re competing against a government job. Government jobs typically offer many more fringe benefits which makes it very difficult for private businesses to compete against. However, while I was against the bill as the chairman of the Workforce Committee, I let my committee members decide if it was legislation that they would like to see move forward. As a committee chair, you control what legislation runs through your committee. However, my approach has always been different. Rather than chairing from the bully pulpit, I ask for and respect the opinions of the members on my committee. This is an example where I allowed their differing opinion on the bill to override mine. Being a leader doesn’t mean you should always get your way, but trusting and respecting the people around you that are part of the process.

The previous edition of the Dickey Dispatch got a bit lengthy, so I was not able to talk about a bill we passed. SF394 was a bill preventing lawsuits against a company for not having a label on their product when the federal government does NOT allow the company to apply the label. Yes, you read that correctly. There is a growing trend in our country among ambulance chasing attorneys suing chemical companies for not having a cancer warning label on products that contain glyphosate. The problem is that our federal government will NOT allow the companies to put that cancer warning on their label because the EPA has never determined that glyphosate actually causes cancer.

This is the exact statement from the EPA web site.

https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/what-they-are-saying-epa-takes-action-provide-accurate-risk-information-consumers-stop

This labeling craziness all started decades ago when California created Prop 65. Prop 65 was requiring warning labels to be put on products to warn the public that something could, NOT would, but could cause cancer. And initially it might have not been a bad thing. However this law has gone from alerting consumers from actual potential health risks, to being a playground for attorneys and advocacy groups that will sue and do sue for nearly anything that has even the slighted connection to cancer.

Here are some of the items that are on the California Prop 65 list:

Tiffany lamps
Amusement parks
Appliances
Wood furniture
Coffee
Tuna

The fact is that over-warning the public itself is a public danger. Warning the public that coffee might cause cancer only causes the public to STOP paying attention to the labels, it doesn’t stop them from drinking coffee! And while California’s Prop 65 list has caused all of this craziness, do you know one item that is not on the Prop 65? Glyphosate! That’s correct. In 2018 California actually REMOVED glyphosate from the Prop 65 list!

The amount of emails and phone calls that I have received from constituents that have been misled as to what the bill actually does was unreal. In fact, SF 394 actually said that no other immunity protections are provided other that the ability to sue over a label. To me, this is a common sense issue. Why should some people be allowed to sue a company for something that OUR federal government will not allow the company to do?

As always, I appreciate constituents contacting me on proposed legislation. However I simply ask that they actually READ the bill first and not just go off internet talking points because rarely are they accurate or tell the full story behind the bill.